Legacy of the Force - The Dream
by OnyxAgata
Summary: A thousand word short story that I did for a high school writing class.


Dreams

Jacen Solo stood on the summer shore on one of the Great Seas of Alderaan, the Sea of July. He observed a swarm of krato eels swim around his feet, partially submerged under the soft, cool water of the halcyon summer sea. His foot dug into the sand beneath the water as the tide rose and fell. He gazed out to the horizon, the day nearing its end but not quite over. He closed his eyes. He wasn't on Alderaan, Alderaan was gone. Destroyed years before his birth. He noted the soft sound of splashing water, and felt some of the brisk liquid splash his leg. He turned and looked at his sister.

She smiled up at him, without a care in the world.

"Hey, Jacen," she said. "Bet I could throw a rock farther then you." She beamed at him, confidently.

"In your dreams," responded Jacen. He ran towards the shore to grab a rock.

He ran up the shore, looking for a smooth rock to throw. He came across a rock he thought would do. He picked it up. The weight was perfect, not too heavy, not too light. Jacen held the stone and looked to the ever pleasant Alderaan horizon. He pulled his arm back, trying to determine where his rock would be in comparison to Jaina's. He threw, with the rock flying towards the water, sending ripples as it flew out to the horizon and past some.

The rock didn't stay gone. It reappeared on the far side of eye's reach and came skipping right back. It came back all the way and landed at Jacen's feet.

"Beat ya!" shouted Jaina triumphantly.

"But, the rock! The rock came skipping back!" shouted Jacen in perplexity.

"Yeah, right. Best two out of three," replied Jaina, bringing her arm back for the next throw.

Jacen stared at the rock, baffled. He picked up another, and inspected the seemingly normal rock. Nothing was amiss, everything about the rock was normal. He looked to the water. the sea was as normal as he ever remembered it. He wheeled his arm back again, determined once again to beat Jaina, and threw with all his might. The rock went flying across the sea. Right back came the rock a few seconds later, coming in as fast as it went out.

"You lose, Jacen!"

"B-b-but the rock," stuttered Jacen, astonished at the supernatural feat occurring with the rock, which again lay at his feet.

"Stop making excuses. I won fair and square," replied Jaina.

"One last time, Jaina, please?" questioned Jacen.

"Fine," pouted Jaina.

Jacen picked up a third rock feeling it, trying to see anything about it, but finding none. He concentrated hard, just as Uncle Luke had taught him to. He reached out in the Force to sense the rock. He felt something, a small glimmer, a window into something more. The glimpse into the Force wasn't coming from the rock. He pushed harder, trying to find the source of the strange disturbance. He couldn't, and resolved to test the rock one more time. He threw with all his might, but the third stone came skipping back. He took a step back, unsure of what mystic and archaic force surrounded this beach.

"Jacen! Honey, over here," shouted his mom from deeper into the beach's sand.

Jacen turned over to the direction of the voice. His mother wasn't previously there, she seemingly materialized out of thin air. She wasn't the only one. He saw his father, the notorious smuggler and Rebel war hero, Han Solo. He also saw his Uncle Luke and Aunt Mara, with a teenage Ben between them. Strange, young Ben Skywalker was only an infant when Jacen had last seen him. He saw his sister Jaina and brother Anakin as well, but well beyond their years. They were strangers, adults; they couldn't possibly be his siblings. Yet when Jacen reached out into the Force, he knew this to truly be his sister. What was his entire family doing here, on such a strange day in July?

Jacen looked down at himself. He himself has aged as well. They were smiling at him, intently focused on his being. Jacen just couldn't understand. His mother spoke first.

"You were supposed to save us, Jacen," calmly replied his mother. Weirdly, her smile stayed firm and welcoming but her voice betrayed her.

"You were supposed to save us, Jacen," repeated his mother, her voice growing more and more ominous. She took a half step closer.

"You were supposed to save us, Jacen," came the near-inhuman vocal repetition from the entire family of Solos and Skywalkers.

Again and again they repeated it, coming closer and closer. The sky was dark now, how had Jacen not noticed that before? He covered his ears and looked down at the beach's sand. He saw a white, transcending mist surrounding his feet. He looked up and realized he was in a white void of some sort. How long had he been there? The now disembodied voices continued, growing more and more stentorian with each passing moment, where had they gone?

The white void vanished, disappearing without a trace. Darkness fell over that made it see as if the Maw itself swallowed all the light in the galaxy. A disturbance reaches out to him, to slightly touch his mind with withering, agonizing tentacles. They grip him around his body and he feels more than just light and darkness. Unbalance, unease, unnatural things plagued him. Two eyes as bright as stars and a mouth as ravenous as any rancor grew to encompass his vision, his entire being itself. The creature utters but booms one word.

_Mine._

Jacen knelt to the ground, covering his head against the onslaught. Without feeling the presence of his hands against his head, he realized he had no arms of which to use. He was bleeding profusely from what appeared to be lightsaber wounds. His leg crumbled, broken and shattered, searing with unimaginable searing pain. He felt this pain, felt it as a tidal wave crashing into. The pain ate his body like a nexu eating prey. He felt a connection with this pain. The pain was an attunement much alike to the Force. Limbs and bones cracked and crumbled. It seemed random, but Jacen knew it not to be so. He closed his eyes, wishing this forsaken place away. He heard the snap-hiss of a lightsaber. He stood and saw his adult sister in front of him. He was in a grey room filled with debris. He reached out into the Force. Reaching out into the Force, he felt a strange presence, one he knew yet another he didn't. This presence was foreign to him, yet he knew exactly who it was. It was his daughter, a daughter he would never see grow up. Orphaned by the cold mistress of Death. He reached into the Force, trying to make her see what he saw. Her life was his life. He would stop at nothing to give her anything short of the universe. Sudden danger flowed into the Force from his sister.

His sister, with a dark, mad look in her eyes, one of desperation, of hurt, thrust the blade into his chest, piercing his heart. Jacen fell face first to her feet, dead.

Jacen woke up, startled.

He reached out into the Force, feeling from galaxies away to make sure his daughter, Allana, was unharmed. From all this distance away, he could feel her. She was perfectly safe.

"Just a dream," Jacen whispered softly.

"It was only a dream," again he whispered silently to himself. Jacen laid back down into his bed, realizing this was the first time he's slept in months.

"It was only a dream," he silently uttered to himself as his tear-filled face fell to the uncomforting bed, not believing his own words for a second. He whispered to himself again and again, tearfully resigning himself completely to the dark void of oblivion.


End file.
